In 2006, when Sam Laidlaw joined Centrica, few people were worried about the securitised mortgage business; David Cameron was urging us all to “hug a hoodie” as Leader of the Opposition and Westlife were Number 1.

Centrica had moved from a conglomerate which, alongside a residential gas business, also at one time owned the AA and the Goldfish credit card (prompting the joke that an energy business needs a credit card like a goldfish needs a bicycle). Rumours swirled that Gazprom was plotting a multi-billion pound bid.

Since then, Mr Laidlaw, a man steeped in the energy business (his father, Sir Christopher Laidlaw, was formerly deputy chairman of BP), has built a significant generation business, has expanded rapidly and profitably in America and has improved service levels in British Gas, the bit of the business the politicians worry about. Given the vagaries of the financial crisis, it is a record he can look back on with some satisfaction.

He is now starting to prepare for a graceful exit. Two sources, with impeccable knowledge of the business, expect he will gone by this time next year. That may be a little bold but it is certainly true that Rick Haythornthwaite, the new chairman who took over from Sir Roger Carr at the end of 2013, has been given the task of planning for a smooth succession. The board and Mr Laidlaw have discussed the issue.

It must be stressed that any move is not imminent. Nick Luff, the finance director, leaves this year and no chairman can oversee a company where both the chief executive and finance director are calling in the removal men.

Mr Luff is moving to the same role at Reed Elsevier, at least partially because being the finance director at a business that some portray as Public Enemy Number 1 is never a happy experience.

I do not believe that Mr Laidlaw is that bothered by the public opprobrium, although he would like at least some credit for Centrica’s performance. He was the man behind the deal which reduced energy bills for customers by removing overly-onerous environmental levies.

What will delay Mr Laidlaw’s departure, beyond the farewell party for Mr Luff, is the political situation. Mr Laidlaw wants to ensure there is some “clear blue water” between him leaving and Ed Miliband shouting about Centrica. He does not want the two things linked in the public’s mind.

That might be difficult – there is an election in May 2015, after all. Mr Miliband has made it clear in private discussions with business chief executives that he sees market failure everywhere and will not be happy until he has broken up at least some of them.

And after Mr Miliband’s public relations success with the energy bills attack, expect more from where that came from.

So, Mr Laidlaw could be a long time plotting his future beyond Centrica, maybe until after the general election. The business should use the time wisely. As Paul Walsh revealed at Diageo, robust succession planning makes for an orderly transition. Investors prefer it that way.

Mr Laidlaw’s lengthy glide-path to the exit runway could well be a blessing rather than a curse.

Game of two halves

When Antony Jenkins became chief executive of Barclays, many people thought his greatest attribute was not being Bob Diamond. Where Mr Diamond was friends with Jay Z and loved nothing better than presenting the Premier League title trophy to the winners (particularly if they were his beloved Chelsea), few would describe Mr Jenkins as a natural showman.

Next year, Barclays will have to decide whether to continue their 13-year relationship with the Premier League as major sponsors and, just as the Royal Bank of Scotland realised that sponsoring Formula 1 may not be the best way to account for its shareholders’ money, senior figures at Barclays believe that pulling out would be the best option.

Mr Jenkins has yet to decide. He has already changed the tone of the deal, launching the Thank You campaign this season in an attempt to inject a more fan-focused feel to the sponsorship.

Sponsorship of the Premier League goes to the heart of what banking is now about. Before the financial crisis, big branding deals were de rigueur in the banking sector, driven by a desperate search for scale.

Now banking is all about utility, with fewer grandstanding bells and whistles. As one senior figure at Barclays said to me: “We just need to shut up for five years and get on with our job.”

Mr Jenkins knows that “not being Mr Diamond” (guilty in many people’s eyes of running a bank while American) is not a strategy for the future.

Next month, Barclays will launch the next stage in its “moving on” programme – a scorecard that investors can check progress against.

It will have eight metrics: two financial (return on equity to rise above the cost of equity and Core Tier 1 capital greater than 10.5pc); two on what is rather messily called “colleague engagement” and diversity and the others on how Barclays’ customers, from investors to businesses to retail, view the bank, using net promoter scores. This will sit alongside a major automation and technology push, which could see the global workforce of the bank fall over the next six years from 140,000 to 100,000. Mr Jenkins wants to see the bank’s cost-to-income ratio, which is at present north of 60pc, drop closer to 50pc.

High street branches will also go, as customers are offered mobile apps and intelligent ATMs to do their banking. Talking to a mortgage adviser over Skype on a Saturday afternoon will become the norm.

At present, Barclays has 1,600 branches in the UK. Expect that figure to fall to 1,200.

A lot of this will be portrayed as “cuts” and Mr Jenkins knows there will be some brickbats but he also knows that providing better returns for shareholders has to be achieved alongside a better business for customers. Banks are still stuck in the technological ice age.

In that context, spending considerably more than £40m a year to sponsor the Premier League looks to some inside the bank as unappealing. Its admitted value overseas – in Africa and Asia the Premier League is a mightily powerful tool – could be achieved via secondary sponsorship deals or direct television programme and player tie-ups.

No decision has been made but Richard Scudamore, chief executive of the Premier League, should put the issue on his radar. Barclays dropped its sponsorship of the London bike scheme (Boris Bikes in local parlance) because it did not believe it returned value for money.

“We do not need brand promotion in the UK,” one executive told me of the decision. “We’re on every high street.”